


the day we felt the distance

by wheeins



Category: Mamamoo
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-06
Updated: 2015-12-06
Packaged: 2018-05-05 08:03:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5367677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wheeins/pseuds/wheeins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>wheein calls hyejin every new year's day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the day we felt the distance

"Hyejin?" Wheein's voice is soft and distant over the phone, but it still fills Hyejin's heart with warmth.

It's been a year since Wheein's last phone call, exactly three hundred and sixty-five days, and not a second to spare. She's called every first day of every new year, a minute after midnight, for the last five years, and her hello was always the same.

"Yes, it's me." Hyejin replies, her voice is steady, but her heart is hammering, and she wants to tell Wheein to speak up, so she can hear her better. But instead she says, "how are you?", a perfunctory greeting, from one friend to another.

"I'm okay. Happy New Year," Wheein responds, and Hyejin can almost hear her smile, so genuine and pure. "How was last year, Hyejin?"

"Um," Hyejin hesitates, tugging at the collar of her turtleneck. It was a question Wheein asked her every year, but this year was different.

"I got married," Hyejin eventually says, after a long, long pause.

"Oh. That's great. I'm happy for you," Wheein mumbles, voice faltering, and Hyejin can hear her heart break, all over again. "Really," Wheein emphasises, a bit more cheerfully this time, but Hyejin believes her. Wheein never lies, and that makes it all the more painful.

She clears her throat, and changes the subject. She asks Wheein about her life abroad instead. Wheein tells her she's in New York now, writing articles about nice restaurants. She talks about Paris, London, Tokyo, Milan, and all her other travels to various beautiful corners of the world. Hyejin tells Wheein she's got articles written about her now. She talks about her art projects and meeting famous people in galleries and museums. They talk about their families, their friends, what's on television, what's on the Internet, about things of the past, and about things to come. It's so easy, to slip back into this rhythm, to fall back into who they were six years ago, best friends with unrivalled chemistry and the same big dreams of limelight and music.

Hyejin would give anything to take everything back.

She thinks back to six years ago, to New Year's Eve at Yongsun's party, when Wheein was a little tipsy and Hyejin was her support. She thinks back to watching the timer start a minute before the countdown, when Wheein was softly asleep on the couch and Hyejin took photos of her to tease her with the day right after. She thinks back to the moment the earth had just begun (finished) another trip around the sun, and the crowd's loud cheering and the claps of fireworks jolted Wheein awake, just in time to join in on the hip hip hoorays. She thinks back to the minute after the clock hits twelve, when Wheein had leaned over towards her, the crowd quietening just enough for Hyejin to hear what she'd whispered in her ear.

Hyejin would give everything to take back the words she'd said when Wheein told her she loved her.

Because she did love Wheein, just not the way Wheein wanted to be loved.

She'd reply Wheein's ninety-five text messages of I'm sorry, and don't leave me. She'd promise Wheein they'd still be friends. She'd tell Wheein see you tomorrow, instead of picking up her phone call a year too late.

But what's done is done.

Nothing will be the same.

Hyejin doesn't go to New Year parties much anymore. She waits for Wheein's phone call at home, curled up in her sofa, instead. Sometimes Wheein calls from her apartment in Seoul or her mom's house in Jeonju. Sometimes she calls from a cafe or a restaurant or a stranger's house far across the globe, in another country. (Sometimes she calls from the phone booth right across Hyejin's apartment building, too afraid to knock on the door, but Hyejin doesn't know that.) She'd never been one for social gatherings anyway, it was always Wheein who'd drag her out for a night of fun, to Yongsun's for drinks, or to Byulyi's for lunch; and these days she had her husband to keep her company at home, where they'd sit in and watch the countdown on TV, kiss when the clock strikes midnight, and say goodnight, before Hyejin sits next to the telephone, and waits for a friend.

"Hyejinnie, you there?" Wheein's voice cracks over the receiver, and Hyejin's heart tumbles into the pit of her stomach. She glances up at the clock. Two hours have gone by.

"Wheein," Hyejin murmurs, knowing her parting words are always the same. "I have to go. It was nice talking to you."

"...Yeah, me too." Wheein whispers, and there's a long silence. All she can hear is Wheein's gentle breathing and hesitation, like she doesn't want to put down the phone, like she doesn't want to say goodbye, like she wants to hold on to the call, and the friendship worn thin with time and space, with too much love and too much regret.

This is the part that's most painful.

This is the part when Hyejin wants to tell her to hang up, and call from somewhere safe, somewhere warm, some other day. The seventeenth of April, or Christmas morning. This is the part when Hyejin wants to tell Wheein she's sorry, for being stupid when they could've been young.

This is the part when Wheein wants to fall apart and cry, and hang up for good, because she's been in love for so long she doesn't know how to stop. This is the part when Wheein wants to be angry at Hyejin because it wasn't her fault, youth was so cruel, and she hadn't meant for any of this to happen.

This is the part where neither of them say anything but goodnight, and Hyejin puts down the receiver.


End file.
